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Mega Man 2
'Mega Man 2' Normal: Refers to the US version of Mega Man 2 , which has a Normal (easier) difficulty. Difficult: Refers to the US version of Mega Man 2's Difficult mode. Rockman 2: Refers to "Difficult". Rockman 2 (Japanese version) does not have a normal mode option. It also has faster text / weapon-get scenes, which makes this the recommended cartridge for Difficult mode speedrunning. Boss Names: Boss names will mainly be abbreviated to the first part. Air Man = Air, Crash Man = Crash, etc. Weapon Names: Weapon names will mainly be replaced by the menu letter they represent. Leaf shield = W''' , Metal Blade = '''M, Atomic Fire = H', etc. 'Notable RTAs Rockman 2 any% in 26:36 by CoolKid ' 'Rockman 2 any% in 26:37 by Cyghfer Mega Man 2 (Normal) in 26:49 by ellonija ' 'Rockman 2 (Zipless) in 28:50 by ellonija 'Boss Damage Table' Notes: *For Atomic Fire (H'), the first number is the standard shot; second is when it is charged more; third number is when it is fully charged. *Damage values for ''Picopico-kun apply to each unit. Destroying one will deplete the health bar by two units each. *Any data with a "+" represents the weapon actually restoring the boss's health completely. *Credit goes to Twilight Man from MMKB for damage values. '''Boss Orders 'Any% (Normal / Difficult) Fastest Order' #Flash Man (Get Item-3) #Heat Man (Get Item-1) #Air Man (Get Item-2) #Crash Man #*Quick Man #*Wood Man #*Metal Man #*Bubble Man Bosses marked with * can vary with each other 'Short Explanation' Flash's stage cannot be sped up significantly with any weapon. You need Item-3 to zip in Heat's stage which saves a lot of time. You need Item-1 (from Heat) to get through Air's stage much faster, especially the rotating clouds section. Crash is always the 4th stage. It is recommended to do Quick 5th as it makes a trick in Wood easier(see later in Zips). Wood is recommended anytime after Quick. Metal needs be 6th or 7th. Finally, Bubble needs to be 7th or 8th (after Metal). 'Zipless (Normal) Fastest Order' #*Air Man (Get Item-2) #*Quick Man #*Flash Man (Get Item-3) #Metal Man #Bubble Man #Heat Man (Get Item-1) #~Wood Man #~Crash Man Bosses with * can vary in order with each other Bosses with ~ can vary in order with each other Short Explanation The fastest "First Three" robot masters order in Zipless is Air / Quick / Flash but also the most difficult due to corner jumping in Air's stage and higher skill level in general required. Beginner / Intermediate players are recommended to do Flash / Air / Quick. The F 'skill will freeze the ''Air Tikki horns and make it easier to traverse the skies. If you have trouble with mashing, you can do Quick 3rd, so you have acquired '''A '''and can one-shot almost any enemy in your way and also '''F your way through the second quick lasers section. Metal, Bubble and Heat follow in that order respectively. They follow each other in boss weaknesses and all require heavy Item-2 usage, acquired from Air. You end with Wood or Crash, based on preference. Zipless (Difficult) Fastest Order #Air Man (Get Item-2) #Quick Man #Metal Man #Bubble Man #Heat Man (Get Item-1) #Flash Man (Get Item-3) #*Wood Man #*Crash Man Bosses with * can vary in order with each other Short Explanation The Rock Man 2 Zipless route is based on the Japanese Community's top runners of the game. The route still requires to do Air first as Item-2 in Zipless is indispensable. There are not a lot of optimizations to do in Quick with items / weapons and the fight can be manipulated / very doable with the P'''. With '''Item-2 and Q''', Metal 3rd can be done fast and the '''M is very useful in Bubble for directional kills and also that enemies take twice the amount of damage to be killed (not to mention M''' is Bubble's weakness), making Bubble 4th a great fit. In Normal, Heat normally comes earlier however to eliminate the RNG factors of a Heat fight that would last twice as long with the '''P, '''having the '''B weapon is essential. Flash is 6th as you need his F''' in Wood for the Hot Dogs section and you need '''Item-3 for Crash's stage. Wood and Clash can be either 7th or 8th, by preference. Basic Mechanics and Tricks Walking vs Jumping Speed: 'Mega Man moves a little bit faster in his walking animation versus his jumping animation, so unless you are performing a trick or specific required inputs, avoid jumping and when it is required and keep the jump as low and short as possible. ] '''Ceiling Bonks: '''When Mega Man jumps and bonks his head on a ceiling, he gains momentum coming downward, falling faster. '''Ledge Jumps: '''When Mega Man walks off a ledge, he starts falling slowly and gradually gains speed. When doing a small jump off the ledge, his falling speed will increase faster and save a bit of time. Combine this with the "Ceiling Bonks" where possible, and you get the best ledge jump. '''Standstill Jump-Start: '''Whenever Mega Man comes to a standstill, he takes a couple frames to start his walking animation before you are at full speed. Doing a small jump forward from standstill will cancel that animation and give you full momentum right away. Situations this is useful in are at stage starts, when you take damage or after going into your menu. '''Screen Transition Ladders: '''Normally, you would jump on a ladder and grab it pressing Up. If you jump off-screen into a screen transition, connected with a ladder, and grab it pressing down instead, Mega Man will be boosted upward a little bit in the next screen. Although this trick initially looks like a zip, it is seen as movement optimization and accepted in the Zipless category as well. '''Bird Spawn Manipulation: '''There is an enemy bird, ''Pipi, that flies towards you and drops an egg that hatches when it hits the ground, releasing its babies (Copipi). The Pipi is designed to fly towards the direction Mega Man is looking as it spawns.If you do a quick wiggle jump(look back and forth quickly) as the bird is about to appear on screen, it will spawn from the back side instead. This can also despawn certain enemies in the game. This trick is useful in Air and Wily 1 stages, and the direction you look is important in the Crash stage during the climb. '''Pause Buffering: '''Pausing and unpausing the game will do various things: The first one is it will reset Mega Man's velocity during a jump, allowing you to travel a bit further with a jump than you normally would. When doing this in succession, you can clear gaps that would otherwise not be possible. It can also be used to avoid damage, typically in the BooBeam fight in Wily 4. '''Metal Blades and Time Stopper: '''When using '''M or F''' while on the ground, Mega Man will come to a standstill animation, losing time. When using these skills, try to use them in the air or during a small jump to avoid this. '''Maximum Weapons on Screen: Each weapon in the game has a maximum number of units of it you can have on screen, so it's important to time your shot when necessary. * Mega Buster (P'): 3 * Time Stopper ('F): 1 * Atomic Fire Uncharged (H'): 2 * Atomic Fire Charged ('H): 1 * Air Shooter (A'): 1 * Crash Bomber ('C): 1 * Quick Boomerang (Q'): 4 * Leaf Shield ('W): 1 * Metal Blade (M'): 3 * Bubble Lead ('B): 2 * Item-1 (1'): 3 * Item-2 ('2): 1 * Item-3 (3'): 1 'Advanced Techniques and Tricks Tricks required in several stages: * Item-3 Climb: '''This trick allows you to climb certain ladder sections quicker by dropping an '''Item-3 just underneath Mega Man's feet, and immediately jumping off of it. This is dependent on mega man's position relative to the reoccurring 16-pixel tiles the game is structured on. you only have a window of a few pixels to be able to throw the Item-3 and be able to land on it after immediately ceasing to grab the ladder (left or right + A). if you're too high, the Item-3 will go way above you, and if you're too low, the Item-3 won't be quite low enough for mega man to land on it. This trick is useful in the Crash and Wily 4 stages, but also helps set up a zip in Heat. * Ceiling Zips: '''You can zip over the ceiling of many levels, skipping large portions of stages. Not to be confused with a Wall Zip. This is done by: *#Entering a ceiling with a '''Item-1 or Item-3, facing right. *#Jumping and quickly pressing left one time (to face left) *#Facing right will stop the zip. Rapidly pressing left and right to slowly move forward is known as wiggling. The Item-1/3 must be slightly to the side of the wall--the center of the item must not collide with the ceiling. The item must also be placed high enough to put you above the screen. You must stand far enough right (assuming the edge of the ceiling is to the left) to enter the wall. If you are too far to the left, you will be ejected to the left. If you fail the input, you will not be able to zip, and must reenter the wall. When zipping through screen boundaries the traversable ground will often be mismatched to the graphics on screen, being pulled from another screen altogether. This can be both very helpful and very confusing (See: Wood Man Zips), and takes time to fully understand. This zip is used in Heat, Bubble, Quick, and the Wily stages. * Wall Zip: '''The wall zip is similar to the ceiling zip (initial entry and movement). However, you will not go above the screen. To initiate a zip, instead of jumping, you must shoot another '''Item-1/3 (which will not actually materialize), then press left. Stopping the zip (press right) and wiggling work the same way. * Vertical Zip : 'By entering a wall similarly to a Ceiling/Wall Zip and then repeatedly jumping, followed by an Up input, you can scroll the screen. Your position on the next screen is dependent on how many times you jumped, and each jump lowers your vertical position. cyghfer's explanation from a mm2 thread in sda forums: ''"The way the NES palette is structured by tiles seems to affect how mega man is inserted into walls/ceilings. you'll notice that when you go to perform a normal zip, mega man always ascends to a certain exact height before you can begin zipping leftward. now, let's say you let the item-1 that is pushing you into the ceiling keep going - you'll be pushed higher into the ceiling an exact amount, basically what seems like one tile. vertical zipping comes into play when there is 1. a screen above the one you're currently in 2. a ladder touching your X-coordinate in the above screen. if you're lodged into the ceiling close enough to the top of the screen and you jump, you'll ascend so that you're not visible on the screen anymore. technically mega man is now in the above screen, etc. etc. further jumps after mega man enters the above screen will decrease your Y-coordinate in the above screen, which affects the height you'll be at when you choose to enter said screen." '''Flash Man Stage: There isn't anything about Flash's stage that we have not already covered in the basic mechanics. The boss fight will be covered in duckfist's tutorial video. Heat Man Stage: * Item-3 Skip (Candy Skip): '''The name coming after the shape of '''item-3, '''the ''Candy Skip ''requires to throw your item at a specific vertical point in the stage so it sticks perfectly to a tile that is normally not reachable. * '''Heat Zip: Air Man Stage: * Corner Jumps / Pixel Jumps: '''There are two section of enemies called ''Air Tikki. ''They serve as platform / terrain but also have horns come out of the top and G''remlins ''from the side. If done fast and accurately, you can jump on their edges enough to make Mega Man stand on his toe, and not hit the horn. There's only 5 pixels of room to land, so it takes practice. When done correctly, you will save time over waiting on horn cycles, or damage boosting through them. Alternately, you can take a safer/slightly slower route by using '''F and freezing them all in place. * Fast Air (Any%): You can skip the rotating cloud enemies, lightning lords, using Item-1 to jump between them, known as "Fast Air". The dangerous method is corner jumping on the clouds, while the safe method damages through them. * Bird Boost: This is the first Pipi you encounter immediately after "Fast Air" section. You have a 3-4 pixel window to jump in the bird in order to take damage at the right spot. If done correctly, this will prevent the next two birds that would appear from spawning giving you a clear path to the next screen transition. * Itemless Clouds (Zipless Only): '''Since you do not fight Heat early in the Zipless category, you do not acquire '''Item-1 for the Air Stage, requiring Mega Man to ride the clouds as intended. . = 'Quick Man Zips' 'Dark Beam Section' Crash Man Zip This is just one method of doing the Crash Man zip. It is possible to start it one screen earlier, as well. 1: Position Mega Man on the edge of the platform and fire an Item-1 to the left. Jump on the platform and move to the right edge of it. 2: When Mega Man is inserted into the ceiling, fire another Item-1 and immediately hit left to begin zipping. 3: After a screen wrap (possibly 2, going from memory here), hold up as Mega Man reaches the position shown on the screen to grab a ladder and climb up. 4: After climbing up to the next screen start walking to the right and switch to Heat Man's weapon. You will wrap around the screen twice, as you are wrapping the second time, start charging Heat Man's weapon. 5: About 2 or 3 tiles after the second screen wrap, press down to grab a ladder. Press jump to release the ladder and Mega Man will die after falling off the bottom of the screen. After you hear Mega Man die, release the charged Heat Man shot to skip the death fanfare and instantly go to the "READY" screen. You will restart at the checkpoint halfway through the level. Wood Man Zips A Wall Zip can be used on the first Dog screen. However, the boundary to enter the next screen (for all three dog screens) is very thin (2 pixels?), so wiggling is recommended. It is strongly recommended you watch an RTA along with the following explanation, as well as practice this section on emulator rather than console. Note: I might have been a little unclear in the next area with some ladder or jump numbers since I'm recalling this from memory. Beginning Screen: '''The main zip (Death Zip) in this stage begins on the screen following the dogs. Doing a Vertical Zip next to the ladder (use 2-3 jumps with timing; gif or video needed) will place you in the first of many unloaded screens. In the first screen, you should end up on a ladder near the top right corner of the screen. If you end up on the bottom right ladder, try again. '''Screen 1: Release the ladder and tap left to zip. After wrapping around the screen twice, your zip will end near the center of the screen, and you will begin to fall. Move slightly right to avoid the bat and fall into the next screen while facing left in order to continue zipping. Screen 2: Wrap around once and immediately press right as soon as the zip ends (near the center of the screen where you entered). There is a large gap, so you may need to pause to land on the platform to the right (It is recommended that you use this pause to switch to Quick Boomerangs, as you will need them in order to perform the next zip). Walk right. You will wrap around 3 times total - The first time you will fall on to a lower platform, the second time you will need to jump over the edge of the screen to avoid the pit, and then jump again in the middle of the screen to avoid another pit, and a third time do a short hop 1 block past the ladder. On the final wrap, you will need to grab the ladder at the end of the hall to initiate the zip -- to do this, hold shoot (with Quick Boomerangs equipped) while walking right and press down to grab the ladder. This will place you in the correct position necessary to begin the zip. Once in position on the ladder, press Left and Up to begin the zip. You will need to pause in order to successfully pull off the zip (use this pause to switch to Heat Man's weapon), otherwise you will fall into a room from which you cannot get out except by dying in the ladder pit on the left. You need to grab a ladder on the right of the screen after this zip. There are two different ways to do it: #1: Time your pause so that the weapon switch keeps the velocity and grabs the ladder high (early in the zip, just after you wrap around the screen), or #2: pause a few times after the zip ends to slowly (but more safely) move right til you can grab the ladder. Climb up to the next screen. Screen 3: Release the ladder and hold left. You will take a step and then fall into the next screen. Screen 4: Continue to hold left so that Mega Man is walking in place (against a wall). Tap jump 2 or 3 times and press up + right to scroll to the next screen. Screen 5: (Need to add info on when you're too high/low). Release the ladder and tap left to zip again. After a single wrap, hold up to climb to the final screen. Screen 6: Tap left and up to begin zipping. Start charging Heat. Zip far enough along the screen to enter the correct respawn zone (past the right side of the lowest bamboo pole platform). Press jump to die, and immediately afterward release the charging Heat to instantly skip the transition to the READY screen. If done correctly, you should continue in Wood Man's corridor. Wily 1 Zips 1. the 1st vertical zip at the dead end, when you start traveling upwards: the setup for this one is pretty precise but you can get consistent at it with practice. while you're on the item-1 rising through the small gap below the ladder, throw an item-1 while facing left and with sufficient distance below the small ceiling to the left of the long ladder AND throw another one somewhat above that one. after throwing the item-1, quickly position yourself so 1. you're facing rightward 2. the leftmost pixel of mega man's hitbox matches or is one or two pixels right of the leftmost pixel of the ceiling. this basically takes muscle memory to be able to position consistently. if you positioned yourself correctly, you should rise into the ceiling. when you've fully entered the ceiling, the item-1 above the one that took you into the ceiling should push you another tile length upward (or, to make it faster, you can jump and the same effect should be achieved). at this point mega man's sprite should be touching/overlapping the top of the screen. jump 3 OR 4 times and then press up+right. the screen should shift upward and mega man should again be touching the top of the screen, halfway into the ladder. in this position, pressing jump once will shift mega man from the climbing sprite to the standing still sprite. pressing jump again will, like before, send him to the above screen, and subsequent jumps will push his Y-coordinate in the above screen down. so, you want to hit jump around 13-16 times and then press up. okay, this is important: IF, when the screen scrolls up to the next screen, mega man is partway in the ceiling, simply hold left and press A, and he will descend onto the ground below without zipping rightward (if you're too far into the ceiling you'll be unable to reach the ground and will be forced to zip rightward and kill yourself). IF mega man's sprite is in the climbing animation and is barely touching the top of the ladder, hold up + RIGHT to avoid entering the ceiling and subsequently zipping to your death. 2. the vertical zip through the long ladder leading to the wily dragon stretch: the setup for this one starts in the screen with the little ground robot that moves leftward. you need to jump up three item-1s so that mega man's sprite hits the ladder when he's offscreen. simply make sure you're holding up+right when such happens (mega man's sprite touches the ladder sprite while above-screen). in the next screen, mega man will be partially hanging off the ladder. throw an item-1, climb up the ladder and then jump & throw item-1s so that, when mega man touches the ceiling while standing on the 3rd item-1, the leftmost pixel of mega man's hitbox is AT LEAST 1 pixel left of the leftmost pixel of the edge of the ceiling. be aware that mega man's "throw animation," during which you can't move, will be active for a short time after you land on the 3rd item-1 unless you jump out of it, but as you probably know jumping while you're rising into the ceiling promptly gets you ejected from it (in most cases). so ideally you want to either land so that you're positioned at least a pixel left of the ceiling or you want to throw the 1st item-1 low enough so that you have plenty of room to walk after the throw animation ends such that you're left of the ceiling. mega man should rise into the ceiling - jump 3 OR 4 times and press up+left. in the next screen, switch to quick boomerang - jumping will, in this case, eject you wholly onto the ladder instead of making mega man ascend a tile upward. switching weapons avoids this. after switching to Q, jump twice and then press up, and voila, you'll be at the top of the above screen. then simply hold down+right to advance toward the wily dragon. Wily 4 Mettaur Zip A very short zip is possible on the second screen of Wily-4. Fire an Item-3 into either of the walls. If fired left, the platform will attach below you most of the time, depending on your relative position to the 16 Pixel tiles. If fired right and not lined up with the 16-Pixel tiles, you will need to climb a short ways to mount it. Once on the platform, face right, jump, and press up right at the top of the ladder. If done correctly, Ladder Ejection will insert you into the ceiling, and you will zip right over the head of the Mettaur. Hallway Zip A short zip is possible in the uppermost room in Wily 4 (The long hallway before the moving platform screens). Attach an item-3 to the left wall just below the top ladder on the screen below. Jump onto the Item-3, face right, and jump above the screen when you are near the very top of it. Press down at the top of your jump to begin scrolling, and hold up to continue climbing. When the screen transitions, Mega Man will clip up into the ceiling and begin zipping. You can get a little extra distance out of this zip by pausing 4 or 5 frames into it. It is recommended that you use this pause to switch to Item-1. Buebeam damage transfer When a Crash Bomb is exploding it's possible to apply it's damage to other nearby enemies by taking damage yourself within a certain distance. In the speedrun this is utilized to kill an extra turret in buebeam trap. The allowed distance from the original explosions depends on certain values in memory that get set whenever you take damage. The general method is to take damage in a specific way that is known to produce good values, then apply the damage in another specific place where you know those values will suffice. There are theoretically a large possible of possible specific setups (which you can explore with this FCEUX script), but two are commonly seen in RTA. The easier and slightly slower one is to stand close to the upper one of the two turrets on the right wall, place a bomb inside it, then jump and fall on it while touching the wall. This will set the damage transfer distance to 30 pixels horizontally and 105 vertically, letting you damage transfer from the bomb you just set to the bottom turret. For the faster one, in the beginning of the fight after the initial wall+turret kill, place a bomb next to the middle turret without killing it, and stand on the middle platform facing right with your left foot one pixel over the ledge (TODO image). Wait for the turrets to shoot, and taking damage from the bullets here will set the damage transfer distance to 80 pixels horizontally and 32 vertically. Proceed as normal, until the wall double kill (or top right wall kill if you miss the double). Now if you managed to avoid damage and still have the values you set up earlier, you can transfer the damage from the wall kill to the top right turret. Category:Classic Series